Star Wars

Two DIY Star Wars enthusiasts have taken to the shop to make a very strange invention. This is the Droid Translator Helmet, and it'll turn your voice into Droid-speak for a second helmet to pick up and translate. Sort of. There's a bit of a trick to it. Instead of actually translating speech word-for-word to a series of beeps and boops, these helmets play sounds from the movies. The speech is not exactly translated so much as it is transmitted.

Lucasfilm and Disney have an announcement for Star Wars fans and budding filmmakers alike: the Star Wars Fan Film Awards are returning for 2016. In what used to be a tradition for the Star Wars fan community, Lucasfilm and Disney have brought it back for the last few years, apparently turning it into an annual event to coincide with the Star Wars Celebration. The Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams even introduces the competition in the announcement video below.

Not by George Lucas' or Disney's will, but by the will of the people, the original version of Star Wars has been released. Truly it is a good day, a day which will be long remembered. Today is a day in which you will be able to attain the 1977 edition of the original Star Wars movie. This was before it was titled Star Wars: A New Hope. For those of you that are unaware, the first big change to Star Wars game in its re-release in 1981 - from there it continued to evolve. Now we have the 35mm original.

Knights of the Old Republic is easily one of the best Star Wars games out there. Star Wars Galaxies still tops my list, but sadly there's no good way to actually play that one ever again. KOTOR was one of the first times you could really engulf yourself in the Star Wars universe, and really feel like you were making a difference. Unfortunately, time has not been the greatest to this game, and a group of people has decided that it needs a new coat of paint, using Unreal Engine 4.

Lego has just revealed its latest Star Wars set, and fans of The Empire Strikes Back will sure to be pleased. The upcoming set is a recreation of Echo Base on the planet Hoth, and it's huge. Consisting of over 2,000 Lego pieces, "Assault on Hoth" will have all the details covered, including base structures, a Snowspeeder, the Wampa cave, an Ion Cannon, and even a Tauntaun.

Sphero's BB-8 toy was the must-have item last year for Star Wars fans, with the droid's rolling sphere body and head that stays upright perfectly replicated in miniature form. This year, however, a new form of BB-8 is going to take homes by storm, and this time it's life-size. At the 2016 New York Toy Fair this weekend, toy-maker Spin Master has unveiled a life-size BB-8 from The Force Awakens, and not only is it controlled via remote, but it will respond to voice commands too.

I don't think there has been another point in history where there has been so much new Star Wars content coming out to enjoy. The Force Awakens opened up back in December, they've already scheduled several more movies to come out over the next few years, books, games, and comics are coming out steadily, and now it looks like another TV show is in the works.

If you love Star Wars and Mario Kart, you will like this mash up of the two. The mash up is a fan made video that was created by Dark Pixel. The short YouTube movie reportedly took a year to make and the finish makes it look like a professional film. The places the characters in the film race are right out of Mario Kart.

The following Valentine's Day gift guide is androgynous and prepared for the nerd in your life. Whether you're in love or just obligated to gift don't want the recipient to get the wrong idea, here you go. This list is for you. It's relatively brief, and everything on the list is 100% full of guilt-free joy. You and yours can partake and feel good about a world full of science fiction and happiness.

Most movies will see two, maybe three different releases in their lifetime. You'll have the original theatrical, then perhaps an “extended edition” and maybe even a “director's cut.” Then you have the three original Star Wars movies, each of which has seen at least 38 slightly different releases.

There used to be a time where I only charged my cell phone every few days, and rarely worried about it actually dying on me. These days, if I don't charge my phone every single night, it will run out of juice before noon on the following day. And if I'm covering a show, or using it heavily, my iPhone 6 might not even last the day. This is why I like having a portable charger in my bag, so that I've always got a way to charge my phone.

What you're about to see is a family portrait that includes Han Solo, Princess Leia Organa, and a third family member. We will not tell you who the third member of the family is here, for that would be a spoiler for Star Wars: The Force Awakens. We know that basically every person in the world that wanted to see The Force Awakens has already seen it, but we're still not going to take any chances. Maybe 30 years down the line when The Simpsons have already done so.